RICS UK Awards Wales: Winners

Introducing the winners from this year’s RICS UK Awards regional ceremony in Wales:

Project of the Year: Y Storfa, Swansea Hub

Category: Public Sector

Nominated by: Kier Construction

Surveyor: Coreus Group

Our project of the year in Wales is Y Storfa, a transformative community hub created through the refurbishment of the former BHS building in Swansea city centre. Delivered as part of Swansea Council’s £1bn regeneration programme, it brings essential public

services together under one roof, including libraries, employment support, archives, learning spaces and community facilities.

Y Storfa was designed to revitalise a key urban location, and promotes accessibility, sustainability and social connection while strengthening the city’s cultural and educational offer.

The hub benefits residents, families, learners, jobseekers and local businesses, establishing a vibrant civic anchor that supports long‑term community wellbeing.

Y Storfa stands as a transformational example of refurbishment-led regeneration: a vibrant civic anchor point that restores pride, strengthens local identity, and creates a high‑quality, people‑centred destination at the heart of Swansea.

Community Benefit Category Winner: Canolfan Pentre Awel, Llanelli

Nominated by: Carmarthenshire County Council

Surveyor: Steffan Jenkins, Carmarthenshire County Council

Pentre Awel plays home to is home to leisure facilities and community health care services, together with business and education opportunities. It’s location on the picturesque coastline at the heart of the Millennium Coastal Park is adjacent to the expansive beaches of Llanelli, Carmarthenshire.

Canolfan is the centrepiece of the four phase Pentre Awel project, designed as five interconnected buildings with a central café as its meeting point. Through focused collaboration and partnership between the public, private and third sector organisations, Canolfan Pentre Awel focuses on health, wellbeing, leisure, community health care, the local community, business and innovation.

Heritage Category Winner: Sker House, Porthcawl

Nominated by: Michael Davies Architect

Surveyor: James Christian, RPA Group

Sker House rises from the sand dunes gazing out over the South Wales coastline. Ruinous and almost lost, a building preservation trust restored the grade 1 listed house in 1999. There were, however, insufficient funds to rebuild the collapsed south end, so this was consolidated to make a romantic ruin.

The trust sold the restored house to an international historian, who continued the restoration and in 2024 completed the rebuilding of the collapsed ruin. The project spanned over thirty years, and has produced one of the finest Elizabethan houses in Wales.

The restoration is faithful to the building’s original design, incorporating various creative structural details. Design decisions were based around blending careful conservation and restoring what had been lost, along with some modern interventions to make the house comfortable for it users.

Although privately owned, it is opened to the public and historical group for tours.

Refurbishment/Revitalisation Category Winner: Prince Charles Hospital, Merthyr Tydfil

Nominated by: Tilbury Douglas

Surveyor: Jane O’Leary, Tilbury Douglas

The Prince Charles Hospital is in the midst of a £241.5m, multi-phase redevelopment of its 21,000m² live acute healthcare facility. Combining refurbishment, retrofit and targeted new-build interventions, the programme is transforming a constrained 1970s healthcare estate while maintaining full clinical operations.

Phase 2, valued at £206m, represents the principal stage of investment. This phase upgrades clinical environments and essential infrastructure, creating safer and more efficient facilities for patients and staff, that will cope with future demand.

Requiring significant collaboration to deliver the redevelopment within a fully operational hospital, the project delivers significant results on legacy risk reduction, sustainability, patient satisfaction, ethical supply chains and community value.

All winners recognised at the Wales awards ceremony will now go on to compete at the RICS UK Awards Grand Final later in 2026. Find out more.